He does not function through them. He is not concerned with them in any primary matter. Not in his aim, not in his motive, not in his thinking, not in his desires, not in the source of his energy. He does not exist for any other man—and he asks no other man to exist for him. This is the only form of brotherhood and mutual respect possible between men.
This does not mean that he is indifferent to all men, that human life is of no value to him and that he has no reason to help others in an emergency. But it does mean that he does not subordinate his life to the welfare of others, that he does not sacrifice himself to their needs, that the relief of their suffering is not his primary concern, that any help he gives is an exception , not a rule, an act of generosity, not of moral duty, that it is marginal and incidental —as disasters are marginal and incidental in the course of human existence—and that values , not disasters, are the goal, the first concern and the motive power of his life.
In spiritual issues, a trader is a man who does not seek to be loved for his weaknesses or flaws, only for his virtues, and who does not grant his love to the weaknesses or the flaws of others, only to their virtues.
The first right on earth is the right of the ego. His moral law is never to place his prime goal within the persons of others. His moral obligation is to do what he wishes, provided his wish does not depend primarily upon other men. This includes the whole sphere of his creative faculty, his thinking, his work. But it does not include the sphere of the gangster, the altruist and the dictator.
A man thinks and works alone. A man cannot rob, exploit or rule—alone. Robbery, exploitation and ruling presuppose victims.
They imply dependence. They are the province of the second-hander. Rulers of men are not egoists. They create nothing. They exist entirely through the persons of others. Their goal is in their subjects, in the activity of enslaving. The evil of a robber does not lie in the fact that he pursues his own interests, but in what he regards as to his own interest; not in the fact that he pursues his values, but in what he chose to value; not in the fact that he wants to live, but in the fact that he wants to live on a subhuman level.
In this book, Rand rejects both options as forms of selflessness, and offers a new concept of egoism — an ethics of rational selfishness that rejects sacrifice in all its forms. These virtues productivity, independence, integrity, honesty, justice, pride are all applications of the basic virtue, rationality. Most people take for granted that actions intended to benefit others are good and that actions intended to benefit oneself are bad.
Why do we need them? How do we decide who should be the beneficiary of our actions? Only when one answers these questions, Rand argues, is one in a position to evaluate egoism and altruism as good or evil. One theme of this book is that morality is a matter of principle, not divine revelation or subjective desire.
A properly defined principle — one that identifies an actual truth about human action — should be acted upon consistently, never compromised. Or between truth and falsehood? Unfortunately, principles have gotten a bad name because conventional ideals like self-sacrifice cannot be consistently practiced without inviting disaster. As a result, compromise becomes essential to survival, consistency seems dangerous, and philosophers like Rand are marginalized as dangerous fanatics.
Egoists are generally assumed to prey on others. Rand writes, "[A]ltruism permits no concept of a self-respecting, self-supporting man—a man who supports his own life by his own effort and neither sacrifices himself nor others…it permits no concept of benevolent co-existence among men…it permits no concept of justice" VOS , p. For her, the truly selfish person is a self-respecting, self-supporting human being who neither sacrifices others to himself nor sacrifices himself to others.
This value-orientation is brilliantly dramatized in the character of Howard Roark in The Fountainhead. The further elements of selfishness—the character traits that, when translated into action, implement a concern for one's own real interests—are discussed and illustrated in that work, in Atlas Shrugged , and throughout Rand's non-fiction. Finally, one might ask why Ayn Rand chose to use the term "selfish" to designate the virtuous trait of character described above rather than to coin some new term for this purpose.
This is an interesting question. Probably, Rand wished to challenge us to think through the substantial moral assumptions that have infected our ethical vocabulary. Her language also suggests that she believes that any other understanding of selfishness would amount to an invalid concept, i. In addition, one might interpret Rand as asserting that her definition captures the historical and etymological meaning of the word.
But certainly, her praise of selfishness communicates instantaneously and provocatively the practical, this-worldly, egoistic, and profoundly Greek orientation of her ethical thought. Reading Lists. What is Objectivism? Personal Application. Browse by Category. Ayn Rand. Current Events. Personal Life.
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